Forum

Recall also that Jesus was made out to be the "son of Joseph" (figuratively, son of Melchizedek). From a typology standpoint, a "Messiah of Joseph" represented a junior or subordinate/collateral line rising to kingship/birthright over a more dominant one.

Originally the line of Enki (Enoch, archetypal Joseph) replaced that of Enlil (El).

Tutankhamun was from the Egyptian New Kingdom "House of Joseph". (His grandfather was Yuya). We've already established the importance of Tut in Messianic tradition, and especially with regard to Jesus in the Gospels.

In Herodian times, Herod was subordinate to Caesar Augustus, but the expectation existed (or was cultivated) that one from his line would ultimately become "Great King". That was "fulfilled" in the person of Nerva and continued with those of his descendants that became Caesar.

The idea of a double dynasty goes back to the beginning. It existed in some form or another throughout the dynastic era. For example, we found that the Libyan pharaohs were subordinate to the main Egyptian throne, and that those inter-related lines are reflected in the Kings/Chronicles narrative (where they are called the "kings of Judah" and the "kings of Israel").

The Persian Period was not much different. It was originally set up as a double dynasty with Cyrus the Great and his brother Darius. Upon the death of Cyrus, the line of the younger brother Darius (the Joseph/junior line) officially became the dominant. However, there was an expectation that a descendant of Cyrus would eventually recover the throne (even as the kings of Judah struggled to take back the throne from the kings of Israel, their closely related brothers.)

For a precedent, the sons of Cyrus would have looked to Sargon the Great, who represented the return of Nimrod's natural line.

The father of Abraham, Terah/Melchizedek, also represented the return of an earlier line to power. Terah was not the biological son of his predecessor Nahor, and was in fact persecuted by Nahor, who maneuvered to put one of his natural sons on the throne.

Finally, Achaemenes himself, founder of the Persian Dynasty, represented the return of the line of Thutmose IV ("Judah") to power after it became subordinate to that of Yuya ("Joseph") and then Ramses ("Reuben").

This is all very tedious stuff, I know. This site is more about how the world should not be run rather than how it should be. But, perhaps our new understanding of the kings and queens of the ancient world is not truly useless. Those people's greedy death-struggle for power and precedence can always serve as bad examples!